‘Broken’ marksman rifle dominating Warzone—and that likely won’t change until next year with devs on break

The MTZ Interceptor is dominating Warzone’s long-range meta, but Raven Software isn’t around to restore balance until next year.

Warzone 2 went through growing pains while trying to establish a balanced pool of weapons. The RPK and Fennec 45 emerged as the go-to long and short-range combo when the battle royale launched in November 2022, but the devs didn’t nerf both weapons until February 2023.

Flash forward to Modern Warfare 3’s Warzone integration and the game suffers from a similar issue. With over 100 weapons, there were bound to be a few guns that slipped through the cracks and separated themselves from the rest of the pack.

But what the player base didn’t account for was a marksman rifle capable of outclassing sniper rifles in long-range engagements.

MTZ Interceptor makes one-shot kill sniping pointless in Warzone

Community members assumed sniping would take over Warzone’s meta when Raven Software re-introduced one-shot kill sniping for Warzone in MW3, but they were sorely mistaken.

WZ expert TrueGameData tested the damage values of every weapon and discovered that the MTZ Interceptor does 190 damage with a headshot. In contrast, the Longbow and KV Inhibitor don’t even crack 160 damage with a headshot. 

The results shocked TrueGameData. “Pretty crazy that the MTZ Interceptor has significantly more headshot damage than the actual sniper rifles, Longbow, and KV Inhibitor, while also having nearly twice the fire rate. It also has essentially zero recoil,” he said.

Players questioned how such an overpowered weapon made it through testing when the difference in power is so “blindingly obvious.” But even if the devs were to respond at this point, a balancing change might not be coming anytime soon as Raven Software appears to have taken off for the holidays.

“Today has been really touching, to see all the love for the teams work is humbling. Thank you for joining us on this Warzone journey, we have a great year planned ahead so will see you in 2024,” Raven Software senior creative director Ted Timmins said on Dec. 6.

Timmins did not officially confirm that the team is on break, but telling fans that he’ll see them in 2024 lines up with the expected Season One Reloaded start date in January. So, at the earliest, fans shouldn’t expect to see an MTZ Interceptor nerf until sometime in January.